The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation’s (DTCC) Global Corporate Actions (GCA) business unit has launched a new web browser service that offers real-time access to its global, validated corporate action database. Brett Lancaster, DTCC vice president of GCA, explains that the service is aimed at providing a low cost entry point to often expensive corporate actions data.
According to the vendor, the GCA Browser provides a direct connection to the GCA Validation Service database, which was launched in 2003 and provides a centralised source of scrubbed corporate action announcement information on global securities. The vendor validates this data via its service centres in New York, London and Shanghai.
Lancaster explains: “The GCA Browser gives corporate action professionals, researchers, and front and back office teams easy access to our precisely aggregated and deeply validated corporate actions data.”
The browser is available as a separate and standalone service offering to new clients or existing clients of the GCA Validation Service. Clients can select as a subscription option whether they wish to view corporate actions against global securities or against US and Canadian securities.
DTCC claims the GCA Browser offers a number of capabilities that streamline access to corporate action information. This includes real time access to all GCA data in full detail through a secure web-based inquiry tool, an expandable search capability to include all exchanges even for a market specific security and the ability to create personalised watch lists for securities. There is no need to provide a security of interest (SOI) portfolio file and the vendor allows for users to create and save common searches for re-use.
The vendor is offering this low cost service to the market in a bid to increase its market share, against a background of budget cutting and reduced headcount. Corporate actions data management projects have been feeling the pressure from senior management, as executives focus on areas such as risk management and compliance.
